I remind you that I write BEAMS, not just a blog. Because my goal for this writing endeavor is very specific; it is specifically designed to lift, elevate and enrich that which I find worthy and good about the human spirit. And in that light; this BEAM is about the topic of imagination and creativity.

     Imagination and Creativity! What to think about it?; Don’t look in the dictionary.. Look in the forgotten or yet to be discovered corners of your soul. There could be mountainous treasures of meaning and beauty that you have only begun to tap.

     In this world of the celebration of logic; this topic sometimes loses its vitality. A soul who lost his way once told me; man is nothing but a “Binary Mechanism.” How boring.  How trite. How trivial. In truth, the Imaginary World can make the real world better. How dull and flat is a man or woman who has reduced life to an equation.

     Many of us when we grew up were introduced to Peter Pan, who reminded us all; that life should be a never ending, childhood adventure. He flew us to Never Never land, where magical things happened and we remained forever young.  But then we got mashed. Life smashed us. Reality reared its sometimes ugly head and blasted many of us with pain and tragedy that closed the portals of Never, Never land to us.

     Yet still many of us have dared the perilous journey back to Never, Never Land; refusing to believe that life can be reduced to the principles of pain & heart ache.

     The thing that keeps many from the healthy journey back into the realm of pretend is a false concept of reality. There was a movie made in 1990 called Mr. Destiny.  This movie dealt with this false concept of reality. In it, Unhappy Larry Burrows sees what his life could’ve been like, had he made that winning home run as a teenager.  James Belushi plays this role incredibly showing the frustration that many of us feel. Life did not work out quite like we planned. The magical scenario’s we had envisioned for ourselves did not work out for many of us.  Yet, the whole point of the movie is that there is more magic in the mundane of our current existence than we realize. We can never attract more of “the good life,” until we appreciate the life that we have.

     I have updated the focus of my online thought from #sales to #Slamism. Because I am interested in helping people find fulfillment in the whole of life. I am interested in helping people discover more fulfillment in their profession, regardless of the category of their career path.

There is a discovery that each of us must make to add the zing of fulfillment to our lives. We need to  see the magic that did not get away from us. The magic that we still have today. The magic that will never leave us, (unless we get cold and bitter). This discovery is paramount in the quest of satisfaction and happiness. Until we see this perpetually present magic that is always present in the gift of life; we can never find the highest forms of fulfillment, meaning and purpose .

     Life is not a way off somewhere or a yet to be discovered someday, proposition. It is a miracle to be experienced NOW! Until you bring the miracle into your present; it will always be beyond you and you are in danger of it being swallowed up by the Nothing (explained later). God grants us one moment to live. The present. And He wants to help us live it with vitality and zeal. But we must see like Larry Burrows did in the movie: that Now is the miracle moment to live . Now is the magical someday!

     When you run across people who have the creativity and imagination thing going on, pay attention. Creativity can be like water in a sponge. Let it in and it will spread. Even if you have  adversity to face.  Creativity, hope and imagination mingled with faith can have an electrifying power in your life. The key is to remember to let it in, let it root dwell and have us. It is not so much that we have it but that it has us.

     God’s amazing well-springs of life can push the darkness out of us. We just have to let them in and let them flow. Creativity does not come from holding onto thoughts but letting your thoughts go, to the fount of  every blessing. You can have more of a multitude of creativity and blessing in your life, than you expect. You just have to let your Higher Power have the controls and fill you with life!

     It can be like a rainbow exploding on the inside of you.  There is likely more wonder, happiness and good to find around you, than you expect. Entertain the magic of the muse; The magic of mirth.. Life is too short not to find joy.

Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, rediscover Laughing for laughing’s sake. Tell a joke; so your life wont be one. Dream, play, have passion, be alive. You can be practical doing it. In fact it will make your practicality more sustainable, to be energized with the effervescence of imagination and creativity.

   A few years ago, I wrote my friend Scout  Deana Meadows ‏@loveubotox and told her to share a book with her grandchildren. “If you give a mouse a cookie, He’s going to want a glass of milk.” OK. OK. I confess, I made my wife read me the book and all its companion pieces.. LOL but really…

I still know there is a child inside me somewhere. I remember to feed him good, uplifting stuff.   // Never lose touch with your child heart. This is not childish. It is healthy and constructive.

    I love Sci-Fi. I draw the line at the gross, sordid, sour, morbid & so dark it is dank. I do not watch the bloody, obscene or revolting. But I do like healthy imagination. So I make it a practice to enjoy it often. (Avatar, Now there’s an example. Remember Star Wars? How bout Shrek?) OK, You get the point.

Some fantasies can help us better envision incredible truths and beauty.  Some way out thoughts can make you well, …. way in..  Way in to a more creative and healthy heart and to a better way to live.

I think it is possible that we Pretend our way to a new world. Didn’t Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. have a dream? And in year’s past his own life, has not his  dream became a living reality? Dreaming can be an unparalleled way to bring wonder and blessing into our lives.

     Yes there is a danger of being too way off and weird. As a minister; I used to regularly warn people: “You can be so spiritually minded that you are not earthly good.” The problem we all had with Santa-Claus was that we found out he is not real.  And life isn’t just a magic wand that sprinkles us with ferry dust and Poof! We get whatever we want. S0me look at it that way and this is as unhealthy as a lack of imagination.

I call this unhealthy, so called positive thinking,  Santa-Clausism.  Life does not have to be Santa-Clausism where we believe in fantasies and the failure of this belief system leads us to disappointment and disillusionment.

     When I was a boy, the most terrifying movie to me was Frankenstein. No matter where you were, he would find you.  And if he found you, you were in big trouble. Many people today act as if they believe their life is in the shadows of a Frankenstein. That a living ghoul follows them and makes their life a terror.

This is an unhealthy imagination. Often people have this kind of imagination and do not even know it. So, Beware the Danger of Frankensteinism. Do you have a Frankenstein that you are letting follow you?

The point of this whimsical investigation of SantaClausism and Frankensteinism is plain.  You can have Healthy or Unhealthy Dreams. Dreams that are too inflated to be real. And dreams that are so deflated that they are false. Both kinds are dangerous. Make sure that your private thought life of imagination is a fruitful, wholesome, bright & beneficial place.

    Many people of faith seem to be confused about imagination. They are either afraid to have it; somehow thinking that imagining will undermine their faith. Or they get so wrapped up in it that their faith does not exceed their imagination.

Faith is not Imagination or is it??? I will not answer this question for you. You must answer it yourself daily. I will help you though. One of the most famous arguments for the existence of God was premised by Anselm of Canterbury.  Anselm fathered the Ontological Argument; with this thought: “God is that being other than which nothing greater can be conceived.” That’s as close to an answer to the mystery of faiths intermingling with imagination; as I will give you.

     I remember being in religious circles that would not let you use the word magic. Because of what the word was derived from. Fooey. Motive is what matters. God will not judge hearts based on meaningless superstitions. (There is my Quaker coming out!) Belief in the right kind of magic avoids the hollow of shallowness. You do not have to be around someone with a twinkle in their eye, a song on their lips and a poem in their heart very long to figure that they are on to something incredible, genuine and good.

    Imagination can be fantasy or it can be fuel for a new reality. I do not believe in conjuring or visioning of life, in the sense of conjury. I will leave my life and its results in the hands of God. But I will give Him my performance and service in trying to make a new reality. And I will give Him a clean heart of healthy, clear, and clean creativity to use in trying to make a new reality. I will plant good seeds and trust God for how the plant grows.

      If the greatest mind of reason the world has ever known thought it good to imagine; I would say we who do so, are on solid ground. Consider the following:

“I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.” ― Albert Einstein

“Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will get you everywhere.” ― Albert Einstein

     The greatest surrealist of all time defined reality in the following interesting terms:

“Everything you can imagine is real.” ― Pablo Picasso

     In closing this BEAM, I am reminded of a fantastic movie from 1984 that I will never forget. It was called “Never Ending Story.” The plot describes the fantasy world of Fantasia. And then it goes on to weave a story in which imagination is being threatened by a force called “The Nothing.” “The Nothing” was a void of darkness that consumed everything it touched.   This is a real danger today that threatens our world. More than that, it threatens each of of us individually and very personally.

The only way to beat the Nothing ….. is to fight it with the Something ….. of a wonderfully healthy and creative imagination. It seems fitting to close this BEAM, with a quote from one of my favorite books of all time, by a deceased author. A deceased author who found that his inner dream was the way to live fully. And though he is gone from our temporal realm; for many of us who read his books; He lives on.. He lives on, Every time we find the joys of creative pondering & musing in our hearts, as he did.

“I believe that imagination is stronger than knowledge. That myth is more potent than history. That dreams are more powerful than facts. That hope always triumphs over experience. That laughter is the only cure for grief. And I believe that love is stronger than death.”
― Robert Fulghum, All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten